In the second volume of his "Lives of the Chief Justices of England," Lord Campbell describes Chief Justices Hyde, Heath, Rolle, Glyn, Newdigate, St. John, Bradshaw, Foster, Kelynge, Hale (3 chapters), Raynsford, Scroggs, Pemberton, Saunders, Jeffreys, Herbert, Wrights and Holt (2 chapters).
Campbell's biographical sketches are not restrained; he expresses his opinions without reservations. This is introduction to John Holt:
"The unprincipled, ignorant, and incompetent Chief Justices of the King's Bench, who have been exciting alternately the indignation and the disgust of the reader, were succeeded by a man of unsullied honour, of profound learning and of the most enlightened under standing, who held the office for twenty-two years,--during the whole of which long period--often in circumstances of difficulty and embarrassment--he gave an example of every excellence which can be found in a perfect magistrate. To the happy choice of Sir John Holt as president in the principal common law court, and to his eminent judicial services, we may in no small degree ascribe the stability of the constitutional system introduced when hereditary right was disregarded, and the dynasty was changed."
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